Saturday, June 17, 2017

Former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams is joining African Anglican leaders as part of a Christian Aid campaign to highlight internally displaced refugees.

New research reveals the number of those forced to flee their homes who have remained in their country is more than double those who have fled abroad, raising questions about levels of support for states forced to rehouse millions of their own citizens.he figures showed that last year alone, the equivalent of one person every second fled their homes and communities to find safety in other areas of their own countries.

The total was around 31.1 million and Lord Williams said they had been 'all but forgotten'.

He said: 'Media coverage, political interest and even the humanitarian community have been focused on those who are actually crossing borders or travelling to wealthier countries; but the vast majority of "internal refugees" receive almost no attention or support.'

From The Church Times-THE number of people expected to start training for the priesthood in the autumn has risen by 14 per cent, the Ministry Division announced yesterday. The growth has exceeded hopes in the division, which is seeking a 50-per-cent increase on the 2015 figures by 2020.

This year, 543 men and women have been recommended for training, compared with 476 last year. A central plank of the Renewal and Reform agenda is to reach 750 by 2020, but also to lower the average age, and encourage vocations from younger women, and those from Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds (News, 7 October).

The new figures include a 17-per-cent increase in women coming forward. Of the 543, 52 per cent are women, and women make up 38 per cent of those aged under 32, compared with a historic average of 22 per cent. The goal is for half of all ordinands to fall into this age bracket; it is currently 25 per cent. Five per cent of recommended candidates described themselves as BAME: an increase of two per cent, but not statistically significant, given the small numbers.

The Episcopal bishop in Memphis plans to resign in 2019 when he turns 70, two years before his mandatory retirement age.

"I'm in good health and I love what I do, but it's time," Bishop Don Johnson said Friday. "This will give the diocese time to start the search process for a new leader."

The Rt. Rev. Don Johnson has been bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of West Tennessee since 2001.

He sent a letter Thursday to the diocese's Standing Committee calling for the election of his successor. The committee will oversee the nomination and election process for a new bishop, which generally takes 18-24 months.

From The Living Church-The Church of England has published online copies of papers circulated to members of its General Synod. The papers detail discussions planned on subjects ranging from the Church’s work in areas where many people follow other faiths to concerns about the cost of applying for British citizenship and the possibility of renaming services for transgender Christians.

General Synod is scheduled to meet July 7-10 at the University of York. The first batch of papers is now available. A second circulation of papers will be published on June 23. There will also be a pre-Synod briefing at Church House Westminster on that day.

One briefing paper in the first circulation sets out how an existing Church of England service for reaffirming baptismal vows may form the liturgical basis for services that help transgender Christians mark their transition publicly.

The French Revolution and its pan-European, Napoleonic aftermath traumatized the traditional ruling classes, clerical and lay. The revolution’s cry of liberty, equality and fraternity turned out to be, as they saw it, a recipe for carnage and chaos. When the revolutionary government seized the property of the French church, it reduced to penury that extraordinarily wealthy institution.Wherever Napoleon’s armies went—and they went just about everywhere—an unbending policy of secularization followed, which included suppression of religious institutes and radical reorganization of church structures. In the Treaty of Tolentino, 1797, Pope Pius VI, thoroughly humiliated, had to pay a huge indemnity, agree to French occupation of the most important cities in the Papal States, like Bologna and Ferrara, and cede to Napoleon possession of hundreds of precious manuscripts and works of art. He died two years later in France as Napoleon’s prisoner.

Friday, June 16, 2017

From Christian Today-The era of 'European Christendom' has passed and it is time for a new Reformation to wipe out the 'sinful' practices of gay sex and gay marriage, according to the leader of the Anglican church's largest evangelical province.

Archbishop and primate of Nigeria Nicholas Okoh, who heads the conservative Gafcon grouping in the Anglican Communion, has compared the crisis over gay marriage to the battle between the heretic Arius and St Athanasius that rocked the church of the fourth century.

That battle centred on the nature of the Trinity. Arius believed, against what came to be the wider orthodoxy, that 'there was a time when the son was not'.

And controversially, Okoh has offered to provide 'missionary bishops' to give oversight conservative Anglicans anywhere in the world who object to the liberal drift towards acceptance of gay marriage.

Loyda Morales was treated a bit differently as a kid growing up in Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico. But that’s just what happens when you’re the priest’s daughter in a city where religion is taken very seriously.

“Maybe I was in denial,” said Morales, as she sat in the empty sanctuary at the Episcopal Church of the Mediator on West 231 Street and Kingsbridge Avenue, where she is about to celebrate her first anniversary as its priest. And that’s quite a feat for someone who originally moved to New York to work at a bank.

Some 20 years ago, Morales found herself in Riverdale living with her brother after a job transfer led her to the city. It was then that the lifelong Episcopalian stumbled upon the Church of the Mediator in Kingsbridge and discovered how she should spend her life — something that wasn’t immediately apparent to her.

“I was not aware of the calling,” Morales said. “But others were aware of it.”

In fact, only 33 refugees have relocated to Pensacola since 2002, according to the Refugee Processing Center.

Still, Harding wanted to help those refugees and their families, most of whom are classified by the U.S. government as "special immigrants" because of their work with U.S. military forces in the Middle East."We want to help,'' said Harding, 33, of her fellow worshipers at St. Christopher's Episcopal Church on 12th Avenue. "But we really don't know how."

So Harding, who attends the church with her husband and young son, called people who do know how to help and who operate the Panhandle refugee relocation program — Catholic Charities of Northwest Florida.

I met with the Standing Committee of the Diocese today to inform them of my plan to continue, God willing, to serve as Bishop Diocesan of West Tennessee into 2019. I have been in contact with the Presiding Bishop to ask him to set the date of the ordination of my successor in accordance with his timeframe.

The Standing Committee will now begin to take the required canonical steps to lead the Diocese through the nomination and election process. By Canon, I am required to fully delegate this responsibility to the Standing Committee. I trust that their work will lead to a smooth transition of leadership, and I invite you to join with me in praying for them, the Diocese, and all who will be engaged in this process. The Standing Committee will be in touch with you to provide information about their work in the weeks ahead.

From The Guardian-It sometimes seems as though Jimmy McGovern named his latest show Broken because his aim is to break his viewers into pieces every week. We are now halfway through this series about Catholic priest Father Michael Kerrigan and the small flock he attempts to bring succour to in the north west of England – and every week has ended with me blubbering incoherently on the sofa.

Now no one does anger and pain and misery quite like McGovern, and with Broken he has plumbed new depths of social despair – but what makes it not just bearable but utterly gripping to watch is his dark, dry humour and the magnificent performance of his leading man, Sean Bean.

Bean’s Father Michael is quiet and conflicted, haunted by his past and battling a sadness that has seeped deep into his soul. He commands the screen, his pain flitting across that gaunt, ravaged face reminding us that some of the best actors say most when speaking least.

It was supposed to be my last premarital counseling appointment with Sue and Mike. Like most pastors I’ve never enjoyed weddings that much, but I’ve always loved the conversations with couples who are about to enter into this covenant. Usually it’s only a matter of time before they reveal the most tender of anxieties.

I thought we had already worked through the biblical and theological perspectives on the apparent issues in Mike and Sue’s upcoming marriage. At this meeting we were just supposed to edit the wedding ceremony. We were sitting at the table in my study with copies of the proposed liturgy in front of us. As I was about to pass out the red ink pens, Mike said, “Before we get into this I have to say I’m really scared.”

He now had Sue’s attention. As he saw her stunned look he quickly added, “Oh, I’m not afraid of marrying you. I’m terrified of losing you.” Then he looked back at me and explained, “Several years ago my mother died, and it almost killed me.” Turning again to Sue he continued, “What if something happens to you too? I can’t imagine how I would survive.”

From Religion Dispatches-While the Southern Baptist Convention considers whether or not to denounce white supremacy and the “alt-right,” it apparently has no such equivocation over the place for LGBT Christians at its annual gathering: gays and those preaching tolerance for them are not welcome inside the Convention’s annual meeting.

At least, that’s the message sent loud and clear to a small group of activists who tell RD they were “forcibly removed” from the convention this morning in Phoenix, Arizona. All told, five people were removed and had their conference registrations revoked, allegedly without formal explanation. All of those removed are affiliated with Faith in America (FIA), a progressive nonprofit dedicated to “[moving] the needle forward on LGBTQ equality in the pews and in our legislation.”

Thursday, June 15, 2017

The United Thank Offering of the Episcopal Church awarded 34 grants for a total of $1,214,447.51 for the mission and ministry of the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion. The grant recipients were approved by the Executive Council, meeting June 9 – June 11 in San Juan, Puerto Rico (Diocese of Puerto Rico).The United Thank Offering is a ministry of the Episcopal Church to promote thankfulness and mission in the whole Church. Known worldwide as UTO, the United Thank Offering grants are awarded for projects that address human needs and help alleviate poverty, both domestically and internationally in The Episcopal Church.The 2017 grants were awarded to projects in 35 dioceses, which included 27 dioceses located within the United States, eight non-domestic dioceses, five companion dioceses, one United Thank Offering internship, and Global Partnerships funding for missionaries.

From America Magazine-American Christianity today is beset by political gloom. This gloominess is certainly evident in this year’s best seller on faith and politics: Rod Dreher’s The Benedict Option, which David Brooks hails as the “most important religious book of the decade.”

Inspired by the philosophy of Alasdair MacIntyre, Dreher argues that “the modern West” is “living under [the] barbarism” of moral permissiveness, secularism and individualism. In this new “Dark Age,” public morality is all about individualistic relativism and “moral choices are nothing more than expressions of what the choosing individual feels is right.” Gone are the traditional virtue communities of yesteryear. Faith is in decline. In its place “barbarians” with “designer suits and smart phones” dominate democracies in the name of a “hostile secular nihilism.”

Dreher believes that Christians have been slow to recognize this fait accompli. What it demands of them is forming local communities of committed believers who preserve virtue for a future flowering of civilization. Failure to do so will “doom our children and our children’s children to assimilation.”

As I considered Ephraim’s paper, it was tempting to avoid its sharp edge, which is its call for us to conform to Christ’s self-giving love, while considering the ramifications of change and an ecclesiology of change. Also, Ephraim called us to consider at least one practical response to the current moment, that is, a worldwide Anglican Synod — voluntarily joined, for the sake of common counsel and decision-making, to draw our churches closer together in the life of synodality that they have long sought.

Instead of avoiding that edge, it seems best to face it head on, and state as starkly and clearly as possible what seems at stake in most refusals to consider the proposal: I want to probe the wound at the center of the Anglican Communion, that is, the violent divisiveness that lurks in Christian hearts and our lack of “self-giving love.” My response focuses on three ideas, movements, or missions: first, the divine utterance or summons; second, the awakening of a human response or echo; and third, the graceful perfection of all things in the Passion and Resurrection. To each of these movements, I will add a question meant to provoke us to an answer.

From Christianity Today-Imagine all the time, money and resources that have gone into church growth in the last generation.Is it naïve to wonder what the world and the church would look like today if all that effort had been invested exclusively in church health instead?Is it possible that if the church had prioritized health, not as a means to growth, but as an end in itself, we would be in a greater position to represent Jesus to the world?We’re often told that one of the reasons so many churches remain small is lack of faith. But I wonder… Could it be that the reverse is true? Might our obsession with bigger and bigger churches be rooted in a lack of faith?

In a 91-page decision, Judge James Boasberg ruled that the federal permits authorizing the pipeline to cross the Missouri River just upstream of the Standing Rock reservation, which were hastily issued by the Trump administration just days after the inauguration, violated the law in certain critical respects.The Court did not determine whether pipeline operations should be shut off and has requested additional briefing on the subject and a status conference next week.The federal judge wrote, “the Court agrees that [the Corps] did not adequately consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice, or the degree to which the pipeline’s effects are likely to be highly controversial.”

Tuesday, June 13, 2017

From Anglican Pastor-When I die, please don’t call my burial service a Celebration of Life. Don’t get me wrong, I hope that people will want to celebrate my life. I just don’t want this to replace my Christian burial.

I want to be buried according to the rites of a Christian. I want to be one more brother in Christ, saved by grace, who died in him and will rise with him. I want to be buried like those who have gone before me.

Grief and Joy

Death is a terrible thing. The burial rite acknowledges the grief and pain of death. It doesn’t hide away from sorrow and loss or need to pretend that death doesn’t happen. Yet it includes both sorrow and joy. “Happy are those who die in the Lord” and “O worthy and eternal Judge, do not let the pains of death turn us away from you at our last hour.” Its all there in a beautiful both/and.

It’s old news that many of Canada’s traditional mainstream churches are experiencing institutional decline. What is not widely acknowledged is that those same churches have maintained a strong influence as this nation’s social conscience. I consider that to be one of the most important Canadian justice-developments during the past half-century.

Societal justice and care-for-the-Earth advocacy have been major ecclesial contributions to Canadian society, and a continuing witness to the gospel in our nation. Those who see decline in numbers as a sign of unfaithfulness to the Good News are taking a very limited view of what is actually happening. Those who are discouraged by some of the statistics need to take heart. There is another side to the story! Church growth is one thing. Faithfulness to God’s word is quite another.

"We tried to make you be like us and in so doing we helped to destroy the vision that made you what you were," stated the 31st General Council of The United Church of Canada in 1986, more than 30 years ago. This was in response to a request of Indigenous peoples that the church apologize for its part in colonization. Since that time, many denominations have issued apologies to the First Nations, not just for the existence of residential schools but for many other injustices.

Elbert McGowan grew up five minutes from Trinity Presbyterian Church on the north side of Jackson, Mississippi. He passed by it daily. Never once did it cross his mind that one day he’d end up the pastor in that building. In fact, he never even considered entering the door.

That’s because the church was exclusively white, and McGowan is black.

Trinity was born in 1950, one year before 13 parents in Topeka filed what would become Brown v. Board of Education and five years before Rosa Parks would refuse to give up her bus seat. Many leaders of what would become the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) barred blacks from membership, defended white supremacist organizations, and taught that the Bible opposed interracial marriage and supported segregation.The past is ugly, so much so that the PCA confessed and apologized for the actions of its leaders even though the denomination wasn’t formed until nine years after the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

The Anglican Church in Erskineville has told other churches in its Sydney Diocese to “review” yoga classes after it banned classes in its hall because the exercise practice may lead to “worshipping false gods”, The Inner West Courier reports.

Radio 4BC host Ben Davis told Sunrise he is venturing a guess that the Social Issues Committee is just trying to “justify their own existence”.

“They [the committee] had a look at the report, and I’ve got no idea but I’m going to tip that they might get paid and we’ve seen this too often in politics where they just try to justify their own existence,” he said.

From Virginia-When former youth ministry leader Jeffrey Bondi was arrested and charged earlier this year with sexually assaulting a young woman, many who knew the father of four were stunned.

But for some others, the question was: What took so long?

The 48-year-old will be tried starting Wednesday on a charge of sexual penetration with an object for an incident that occurred more than 15 years ago in Bondi's home. Prosecutors have declined to identify the object.

Both sides agreed to have a judge hear the case instead of a jury. If convicted, Bondi could get up to life in prison.

The woman involved was an 18-year-old freshman at James Madison University at the time and had been a member of two youth ministry groups Bondi led. She also frequently babysat Bondi's children and was at his house on Oct. 26, 2001, to watch them.

I was ordained in 2009 to plant churches in AMiA, trained by some of the strongest Christians I have ever met. My mentors, two in particular, are to this very day among the greatest spiritual leaders I have ever known. I love them dearly. They believed in me and saw within me a calling to the priesthood, which was nowhere on my vocational radar. They entrusted me with ministry opportunities and sent me out to learn, fail, and occasionally, by God’s grace, to succeed. This is why it was doubly painful when AMiA suffered an internal meltdown due to issues related to finances and submission to authority. I wanted to be a priest in the Church, not a missionary society. Thus began my journey toward the Episcopal Church.

Monday, June 12, 2017

From Episcopal Cafe- I would also like to remind you of the 1988 Lambeth Conference resolution number 72 on episcopal responsibilities and diocesan boundaries. This resolution reaffirms the historical position of respect for diocesan boundaries and the authority of bishops within these boundaries. It also affirms that it is deemed inappropriate behaviour for any bishop or priest of this Communion to exercise episcopal or pastoral ministry within another diocese without first obtaining the permission and invitation of the ecclesial authority thereof. The conclusion of this resolution was that in order to maintain our unity, “it seems fair that we should speak of our mutual respect for one another, and the positions we hold, that serves as a sign of our unity”.

The issue of cross-border interventions has continued to come up in recent conversations within the Anglican Communion, and may well be something that is included in the agenda for the next Primates’ meeting, which takes place from 2 to 7 October 2017, in Canterbury. The Anglican Communion Secretary General, Archbishop Josiah Idowu-Fearon, has written to you concerning arrangements for the meeting, and his staff will be in touch as further details on the logistical and other practical arrangements emerge.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has warned GAFCON against causing “disturbance and discords” by intervening in Britain, adding that “cross-border” intervention would “carry no weight in the Church of England.”

There is no need for a missionary bishop, he said, since there is enough space in the church to accommodate a range of views. The early Church’s First Council of Nicea in 325 condemned interventions and the “great disturbances and discords that occur” resulting from actions of this kind.

Jonathan Petre, religion reporter for The Mail on Sunday, has the knack of acquiring well-timed scoops and finding a fresh angle on well-worn stories. It has long been no secret that GAFCON, the conservative Anglican network, intended to parachute in the Rev. Canon Andy Lines as its bishop in the United Kingdom if Scottish Anglicans approved gay marriage.

From ENS-The Episcopal Church’s Executive Council spent three days in a historic meeting here marked by relaxed conviviality during which the members trained their sights on the next General Convention, a year from now.This was the first time that council met in a Province IX diocese since February 2008 and it is believed to be the first meeting ever in Puerto Rico. Presiding Bishop Michael Curry said during a post-meeting news conference June 11 that it was important for council to have come to the U.S. territory “as Puerto Rico is struggling and seeking to discern its future.”Puerto Ricans voted that day to become the country’s 51st state. The vote was contentious and attracted the fewest number of people to the poll since 1967. Most observers say that the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress will never grant Puerto Ricans’ request, in part because the territory leans towards the Democratic Party.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has criticised conservatives for planting a 'missionary' bishop after Scotland's Anglicans approved gay marriage in church.

It comes conservatives appointed Canon Andy Lines as missionary bishop, making him an alternative figurehead outside the official church structure and effectively prompting a split in the UK Anglican church.Justin Welby's rebuke came in a blunt letter to leaders across the worldwide Anglican Communion accusing Lines and his colleagues of a 'cross-border intervention' and saying he would 'carry no weight' in the Church of England.

In an unusually direct intervention, Welby quoted one of Christianity's most formative edicts, from the Council of Nicea in 325 AD, condemning 'cross-border interventions' for the 'great disturbances and discords' they cause.

From Australia-EVERY few years the global Anglican Church experiences a shudder over the “women” question.

Should women be ordained as priests? Should women be ordained as bishops? Should the church subscribe to the view of the apostle Paul, who outlined in the New Testament a view of family and church life with men at the head, or should it accept that a 2000-year-old text doesn’t need to be taken literally on all points?

In Australia the Anglican Diocese of Sydney leads the “no women priests and bishops” group, and continues to argue strongly that it’s the majority Church of England, which has supported women bishops since 2008, which has strayed from the Bible.

It could be considered a tale of three religions involving a Jewish congregation, the state’s only Hindu temple, and an Episcopal parish.

On Sunday, Congregation Or Chadash marked its move from the Hindu temple that once served as its home to its new home at Trinity Episcopal Church in Cranston with the ceremonial carrying of its three Torahs through Pawtuxet Village.

“This whole event is to celebrate a new life,” said Judith Bessoff. The congregation’s name itself — Or Chadash — stands for new light, she said.

The procession started in the parking lot of the former Bank Cafe, in the heart of the village on the Warwick side. Three congregation members carried hefty Torah scrolls, each containing five books central to Jewish teachings, under the cover of a sheer white chuppah. The group made its way across the Narragansett Parkway, over the Pawtuxet River Bridge and onto Broad Street up Cranston.

“When you move a Torah, you’re supposed to hold it close to keep it safe,” Bessoff explained.

Traffic halted to let the procession pass in the blazing heat. Onlookers shot photos as the parade of 30-plus members of Or Chadash and Trinity Episcopal marched through the village, as a light breeze blew under overcast skies. The group passed restaurants, ice cream shops and a liquor store as it made its way.

Sunday, June 11, 2017

From The Daily Mail-The Archbishop of Canterbury has hit out at traditionalists who are planting a ‘missionary’ bishop in the UK after last week’s historic vote by Scottish Anglicans to approve gay marriage.The rebuke from Justin Welby is his latest attempt to avert a damaging permanent split in the worldwide Anglican Communion over homosexuality.As this newspaper revealed earlier this year, conservative archbishops, led by the Archbishop of Nigeria, Nicholas Okoh, are to consecrate Canon Andy Lines at a meeting in America this month after warning that Western churches are abandoning biblical teaching on the issue.These archbishops say the new missionary bishop would support disaffected Anglicans who quit in protest at the Scottish Episcopal Church’s decision on Thursday to become the first Anglican body in the UK to allow same-sex marriage in its churches.

In response to a statement from Archbishop Josiah Idowu-Fearon, Secretary General of the Anglican Communion (which can be read here), The Most Rev David Chillingworth, Bishop of St Andrews, Dunkeld & Dunblane and Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church says:

“The Secretary General of the Anglican Communion has issued a statement commenting on Thursday’s decision by the General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church to amend its Canons to permit same-sex marriage. The statement recognises that the Provinces of the Anglican Communion can each take these decisions within their own life. But I think it is important that I should comment on some other aspects of what the statement says and their implications for the continuing life of the Anglican Communion.

“The classic understanding of the position of Provinces of the Anglican Communion is that they do indeed have autonomy. But that autonomy is exercised in tension with a balancing sensitivity to the interdependence of provinces within the Communion. We, in common with other provinces, did not feel that the Anglican Covenant could successfully meet this need. The statement implies that the Primates’ Meeting will now fulfil this role. But such a role is not within their remit or authority. For the Primates’ Meeting was called together originally by Archbishop Coggan for ‘leisurely thought, deep prayer and consultation’.

From Premier-Traditionalist Anglicans in the UK are being given new hope as a new bishop has been appointed to look after those unhappy at potential changes to church teaching on sexuality.

Despite not being appointed with the blessing of church officials here, Rev Canon Andy Lines said he had accepted the new role because it is a "logical next step".

Speaking on the divide within the Anglican Communion his appointment could cause, he told Premier: "I think that actually the people who should have worried about that are the people who've made the decision today in the Scottish Episcopal Church because they're the ones who are moving away.

"I am staying where the Anglican Communion has always been in its beliefs."

The Scottish Episcopal Church recently voted in favour of allowing same-sex couples to be allowed to marry in church, putting it at odds with the majority of the global Anglican Communion.